Back in the 16th century, there
was a great concern within churches to ensure that believers- young and old
alike- had a good grasp of basic Christian beliefs. This arose out of the conviction
that what we believe shapes how we behave, and since we want to behave according
to God’s will, then in order to do so we need to understand God and his
world a little better. And so to help Christians along, some churches drew
up a question and answer method of learning, called catechisms. And one belief
in particular which was considered to be central to healthy Christian living
was the belief in God’s Providence. This is how what is called the Heidelberg
catechism (1562) handles that particular belief:

Question: What do
you understand by the providence of God?
Answer: The almighty and ever-present
power of God whereby he still upholds, as it were by his own hand, heaven and
earth together with all creatures, and rules in such a way that leaves and
grass, and rain and drought, fruitful and unfruitful years, food and drink,
health and sickness, riches and poverty and everything else come to us not
by chance but by his fatherly hand.

We might think-‘fine but
so what?’ hence the next question:

Question: What advantage
comes from acknowledging God’s creation and providence?
Answer:
We learn that we are to be patient in adversity, grateful in the midst of blessing,
and trust our gracious God and Father for the future, assured that no creature
can separate us from his love, since all creatures are so completely in his
hand, that without his will they cannot move.

And if you want to
find someone in the Bible who did precisely that-‘learnt patience in
adversity and was grateful in the midst of blessing and who trusted God for
the future’, you need look no further than Joseph, especially as we see
him in Genesis 39. So let’s turn to this passage and be encouraged.

First,
we have Providence and man’s purity.

The reason why this chapter
is so well known is because it contains the account of a powerful temptation
which is remarkably resisted. I say the resistance was remarkable because you
have to try and put yourself in Joseph’s sandals. Here is a 17 year old
youth who has been taken away from his homeland and dropped into what was then
the most powerful nation on earth- Egypt. He was from Canaan and the people
there didn’t speak Egyptian and so straight away you have the problem
of a language barrier. He has no friends, no money and he’s a slave-
v 1, ‘Now Joseph had been taken down to Egypt. Potiphar, an Egyptian
who was one of Pharaoh’s officials, the captain of the guard, bought
him from the Ishmaelites who had taken him there.’ Now we are not to
move on too quickly to the next few verses which have Joseph placed as the
senior household administrator. That wouldn’t have happened overnight.
Joseph would have started on the bottom rung of the social ladder- cleaning
out the toilets, emptying the rubbish, running the errands- all the degrading
and menial stuff. And this would have gone on for some time- day after day,
month after month, with no end in sight.

But eventually a light did
begin to shine at the end of the long dark tunnel as his master, Potiphar-which
may have been his name or his title- noticed there was something special about
Joseph- he had great potential, he could actually deliver the goods. And so
he was promoted, no doubt gradually, to be in charge of the whole household-
that was some responsibility. He was Potiphar’s man on the spot- acting
in the place of Potiphar himself on a day-to-day basis. And that is when someone
else took notice of him but for a very different reason- Potiphar’s wife
who wanted to get him into her bed. After all, he was, we are told, ‘well
built and handsome’- she wanted him has her ‘toy boy’, a
sexual play thing.

It doesn’t take that much of an imagination
to work out what kind of thoughts would run through his mind. He has been abandoned
by his family. He has little prospect of marriage. He is young- he has needs-
this is the season for male hormones after all, as an older teenager. And who
was to know? He organises everyone’s timetable so he could easily arrange
things so that people are out of the house while they are in the sack. Maybe
he could so ingratiate himself with Potiphar’s wife that she could sweet
talk her husband into giving Joseph his freedom. In other words, there are
a thousand and one reasons why this might seem to be an offer he couldn’t
refuse. And the enticement came not just once- an off chance opportunity on
the part of the wife- but time and time and time again. The pressure to give
in was relentless.

And yet Joseph stood firm-v 10, ‘And though
she spoke to Joseph day after day, he refused to go to bed with her or even
be with her.’

How do you account for that?

The
answer lies with Joseph himself- the character that God had formed over the
previous years by his Providence.

Joseph was able to deal with the
temptation in the house because of the work God had performed in his heart.
He would have heard from his father, Jacob, of God’s dealings with his
forefathers-especially Abraham. That he was a God who made promises and kept
them- he was a faithful God. That he was the 'judge of the earth who would
do what is right’- a righteous God. That he committed himself to his
people and his people, in turn, were to be committed to him- he was a covenantal
God. And all of these things he would have pondered and embraced. And without
doubt it was by drawing on these things that Joseph would have kept sane on
that long journey into Egypt, so he could be, in the words of the catechism,
‘patient in adversity, grateful in the midst of blessing, and trusting
his gracious God and Father for the future.’ In other words, God had
forged within Joseph a godly character. This was no spiritual snowflake; this
was a young man with a moral compass resolutely set on God. He saw things differently.

Now,
someone else looking at the same circumstances might have come to an entirely
different conclusion and so accommodate Potiphar’s wife’s lusts-v
8. ‘With me in charge, my master does not concern himself with anything
in the house’- so, one might think, he needn’t concern himself
with his wife either-I can take care of her in more ways than one. ‘No
one is greater in the house than I am’ –so why shouldn’t
I have a few perks- even sexual ones? My master has not withheld anything from
me’- so what is the problem in going one stage further and having his
wife- no one need know.’ It could be seen as a win/win situation all
round- Potiphar has a well-managed estate, Potiphar’s wife is serviced
in bed, and Joseph has it all- sex and status.

But he doesn’t.
Look at what he says instead: ‘My master has withheld nothing from me
except you, because you are his wife. How then could I do such a wicked thing
and sin against God?” And then, v 10, ‘he refused to go to bed
with her or even to be with her.’

Joseph looks at the situation
and reads it very differently to the way many would today because he has developed
what can only be called a godly character. He sees how kind and trusting his
master has been towards him and concludes it would be plain wrong to abuse
that trust and sleep with his wife- how could he do such a monstrous thing?

Now
character is something which is downplayed today but central to the Bible.
Our culture speaks in terms of someone’s personality. But character,
what the Bible calls the ‘heart’, is of supreme concern to God-
‘Above all else, guard your heart, for everything you do flows from it.’
(Prov. 4:23). Having a good character will mean that we will be people of integrity-
not saying one thing and doing another, but saying what we mean and meaning
what we say.

You see, how we will respond in a moment of temptation
will depend upon the character we have been cultivating over a lifetime. Don’t
expect that if you neglect your prayer life, reading the Bible, meeting with
God’s people and hearing his Word, that when trials come your way (and
they will) you are going to be any match for them- because you won’t.
But if by those day to day spiritual workouts you develop the spiritual fibre
and moral muscles of the godly-the outcome is likely to be very different.

And
one of the features of such a godly character is that you recognise a thing
for what it is and calling it for what it is- that sin is sin. Did you notice
how Joseph names what was being suggested by Potiphar’s wife? –v
9, ‘How then could I do such a wicked thing and sin against God?”

One
of the first things that tend to happen when we are being tempted is that we
stop calling the thing we are being tempted to do ‘sin’. We use
other euphemisms- ‘It is peccadillo’, ‘a weakness’,
‘a momentary lapse’- in this instance even ‘love’-
as long as it is between two consenting adults what could be wrong with it
when both have their needs met? But Joseph identifies it and names it for what
it is and in so doing raises his moral defences- it is a ‘wicked thing
and sin against God’. Sure, what is being proposed would be a sin against
Potiphar. It would be a sin against Potiphar’s wife. It would even be
a sin against Joseph’s own body. But first and foremost sin is always,
always, sin against God. We may fool ourselves ‘Well nobody gets hurt
if I indulge in this’ which is rarely the case anyway, but we are to
get it firmly impressed in our minds that if we ‘indulge in this’
(whatever ‘this’ is), it is an affront, a spitting in the face
of God. And Joseph could not bear the thought of doing such a thing. And of
course the only reason we can and do such things is because we don’t
give it much thought; we don’t construe sin in this way because if we
did, it would become less attractive and more repulsive. Is that not so?

What
is more, such integrity of character meant that Joseph took practical steps
to put himself, as much as he was able, out of temptations way. He wasn’t
so super-spiritual that he thought he could handle it. No, a godly person has
such an awareness of the corruption of his own heart, that it is like dry kindle,
one spark and –‘whoosh’ up it goes- such that he won’t
even risk it. And so Joseph will not even be in the same room as her. How did
Jesus put it, ‘If you right eye causes you to stumble (that is what you
are tempted to look at something or someone you shouldn’t) gouge it out’-
we have to be practically ruthless with sin.

And the reward for Joseph
being faithful? A jail sentence would you believe?! What is the saying? ‘Hell
hath no fury like a woman scorned’. That is certainly what you see here
with a vengeance. Having had her advances spurned by Joseph, Potiphar’s
wife accuses him of attempted rape-v13 and her husband believes her. Betrayed
by his brothers, Joseph is now betrayed by his Master’s wife to spend
years in prison.

And you may think: where is God in all of this?
Well, the writer wants us to know that God is where he has always been- present
with Joseph, in the good times and the bad, which leads us to our next heading:
Providence and the presence of God.

Just take a look at the two ‘bookends’
which frame this story- v2ff, ‘The Lord was with Joseph so that he prospered,
and he lived in the house of his Egyptian master. When his master saw that
the Lord was with him and that the Lord gave him success in everything he did,
Joseph found favour in his eyes and became his attendant. Potiphar put him
in charge of his household, and he entrusted to his care everything he owned.
From the time he put him in charge of his household and of all that he owned,
the Lord blessed the household of the Egyptian because of Joseph. The blessing
of the Lord was on everything Potiphar had, both in the house and in the field.
So Potiphar left everything he had in Joseph’s care; with Joseph in charge,
he did not concern himself with anything except the food he ate.’ And
then v20b, ‘But while Joseph was there in the prison, the Lord was with
him; he showed him kindness and granted him favour in the eyes of the prison
warden. So the warden put Joseph in charge of all those held in the prison,
and he was made responsible for all that was done there. The warden paid no
attention to anything under Joseph’s care, because the Lord was with
Joseph and gave him success in whatever he did.’ Do you see how the wording
is more or less identical, designed to make an important point- namely, whatever
the circumstances we are in God is present with us for our strength and his
glory. Think back to that catechism, and the question, ‘What do you understand
by the providence of God?’ the answer- ‘The almighty and ever-present
power of God whereby he still upholds, as it were by his own hand, heaven and
earth together with all creatures, and rules in such a way that leaves and
grass, and rain and drought, fruitful and unfruitful years, food and drink,
health and sickness, riches (the first part of the episode) and poverty (the
end of the episode) and everything else come to us not by chance but by his
fatherly hand.’ God’s fatherly hand is as much at work in Joseph
in prison as much as in the palace. When times are dark we are not to conclude
that God has left us, but that it has simply got dark. When times are bright
we are not to think that God is much closer to us- it is just that the times
are bright. God is no more or less present depending up the circumstances-
his presence is as full and certain on earth as it is in heaven. That is what
the writer wants to impress upon us, so that, with Joseph, ‘we are to
be patient in adversity, grateful in the midst of blessing, and trust our gracious
God and Father for the future.’ Do you see?

God is in all the
detail. At the beginning of the story four times in four verses the author
reminds us that God’s hand is in Joseph’s circumstances as he speaks
of the ‘Lord’ doing this and the ‘Lord’ doing that.
And it is no accident either that Joseph ends up in prison, the King’s
prison at that. You have to understand that for what Joseph is accused of doing
he could have be executed- no questions asked. That was not part of God’s
plan and so no matter how outraged Potiphar is, he is not permitted to take
Joseph’s life, rather he puts Joseph exactly where the Lord wants him
to be- Pharaoh’s prison. Why?

Well, this brings us to our final
and very important point- Providence and the purposes of God.

We
need to think through why this chapter is here in Genesis?

Well,
the first thing is that it forms a contrast with chapter 38. There you have
Joseph’s brother Judah in freedom having sex with someone he is not meant
to have sex with- being a real sleezball, and here you have Joseph in slavery
retaining his moral integrity. Judah is the one from whom the Christ is going
to come for goodness sake! But what matters most to God is not one’s
position, but one’s faithfulness.

Secondly this chapter drives
God’s plan of redemption along until it finds its fulfilment in the coming
of Jesus is the New Testament. Let me explain. Joseph at this stage is a kind
of Saviour. God’s plan is to get him into Pharaoh’s presence to
eventually become Pharaoh’s Prime Minister, so that when the famine comes-
it will be Joseph who will save his own family, as well as whole nations by
his wisdom and planning. Now think on this: if Joseph had not been in this
position, his own family would have died of starvation, together with countless
thousands of others, and then what would have become of God’s promise
to Abraham that from him a Saviour would eventually come? So from a human perspective
we can say: because of Joseph’s faithfulness in Potiphar’s palace,
he was placed in Pharaoh’s prison. Because of his faithfulness in
Pharaoh’s prison, he was placed in Pharaoh’s court and because
of his faithfulness in Pharaoh’s court, he saves his people from whom
will eventually come the Christ, the Saviour of the World. Putting it bluntly,
humanly speaking, Jesus was born because Joseph kept his flies buttoned up!
Do you see how simple acts of faithfulness can have momentous consequences
which far outlast our own lifetime for good or ill? Never think that what you
do or don’t do is insignificant- they are.

Think of it this
way.

You are a Christian father or mother, or maybe grandparent.
You haven’t preached to crowds. You haven’t led dozens to Christ.
But each day you have been seeking to be faithful to the Lord. You bring your
family before him in prayers. Your evident love for Jesus and his people and
your integrity -that you are not one thing on a Sunday and hypocrite on a Monday-
has an impact on those children. They in turn decide to follow the Lord Jesus
and follow in their parent’s or grandparent’s footsteps. They too
have children, some of whom do the same, and this continues until a few generations
down the line you have the next Billy Graham or John Wesley! That could be
God’s plan and it can be traced all the way back to those little acts
of faithfulness and love of a Christian family here in Hull. Maybe, we don’t
know. What we do know is that faithfulness counts- getting on being people
of integrity where God has placed us for better or for worse- leaving the good
purposes he intends- unbeknown to us- in his strong, capable hands.

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